Monday, 28 April 2008

This man allegedly kept his daughter and three of the seven children he fathered on her imprisoned for 24 years, adopting the other three (the seventh died).

A psychologist has reported on this case at the link above, when asked the most obvious question: HOW could someone do this? That is, mentally speaking, how would someone be able to do this? How could you imprison, rape and abuse your own children?

I see this so often with Parental Alienation and indeed often ask the same question myself. How on earth could anyone actively wish to abuse anyone else?

The psychologist's answer was that a certain type of person believes it is their right to treat people as they want, especially their children. My male parent exhibits traits of this nature: he considered himself "owner" of his family, my mother and my sister and me, and said as much in public. He felt himself "in charge". "No one tells me what to do". "I know things other people don't". He felt he was cleverer than everyone else.

When no one listens to him, they are targets for verbal abuse -not just complaints or whinges, like "Oh, you're so annoying," but extreme and foul abuse. My mother and one of her sisters were called whores by him - he called my mother a whore in front of me! Amongst other things! As I've mentioned before, her cancer "was her own fault".

When I reached puberty, things changed a little. He suddenly noticed me in a different way. He leered at me, tried to stand too close and rub himself up against me (arms or legs), lay on top of me and kissed me all over my face, ran his hands up and down my back to see if I was wearing a bra ... I tried to keep myself out of the way. I stopped going near him whenever possible. I wouldn't give him hugs anymore, though he forced them. He was always looking at me with a dirty smile on his face. It's sickening to even remember it. He constantly made comments about me growing up, quite often dirty. I refused to play Scrabble anymore when he used the word "erection". I began to hate going to his house every third weekend and did everything I could to get out of it. At first, no one really listened to me, and he'd be "reasonable": "She doesn't have to come if she doesn't want to", and I was forced into it once or twice. From a logistical point of view, I think perhaps Mum felt guilty that he had driven four hours for me to refuse to go. My credibility wasn't brilliant because my PA behaviour (and Asperger's?) was wonderful for twisting incidents into crazy misrepresentations of the truth.

ANYWAY, back to the authoritarianism. Mum told him we didn't like his leering and talking and jokes and curiousness about our pubertal development. He was embarrassing us. Could he please stop? His answer made me begin to realise what a selfish man he is. He didn't apologise. He didn't even stop. In fact, he told us it was his right to do it because he was just proud. He said he wasn't going to stop because he wasn't doing anything wrong, and that he could do what he wanted. "You're my daughters, I can do what I like". I had a similar discussion with him on my sister's wedding day. She had come to me privately a few days before and said "I'm dreading him doing all that stuff on the day. Please talk to him." So I did - and had almost the same conversation.

"If you do that, it will embarrass her.""I can do what I like".

And yay me - I stood up for us!!!! I nearly passed out with fear but I was defending my sister! And, in a roundabout way, myself.

"No, on this occasion, you can't.""I can. I can do and say what I like"."NO. YOU CAN'T. YOU WILL NOT DO THIS ON HER WEDDING DAY! I'll speak to C (his partner) about this if I need to, but you will not mention her growing up once. You will spoil her wedding day. She's afraid you're going to go on about her growing up. I'll tell C all about this if you don't promise not to say a word!"

And he didn't do it! The threat of being grassed up. That's interesting - I've just realised the connection (duh). He behaved himself because I threatened to tell tales on him. When I threatened to tell Mum about him going on about us growing up, he said what I said before: that he wasn't doing anything wrong. He didn't have to worry about Mum's opinion of him - for some reason. In his mind, he had already discredited her? But the current partner - he didn't want her to know. Interesting.

I think this brainwashing (that he could do whatever he likes because we are his children) is the reason I never told anyone about the inappropriate behaviour. I was un-credible anyway to some degree, so the chances of being believed were slim. Perhaps he knew that. In my mind, he could do anything he liked because he was in charge. He believed it was his right to do certain things to me, so because I was "on his side", I believed it too. I've often wondered why I let him do it. I *thought* it was wrong but because I believed everything he said, I believed I was wrong too, so I tolerated it. That's a realisation right there in front of you, folks, thanks to a Sky New psychologist and my own ramblings. I've just worked that out. I was brainwashed into thinking he could do no wrong so when he did wrong, I didn't know it. "You're just imagining it". He made all sorts excuses for his behaviours. He noticed when I wouldn't stand near him anymore and he pushed it. He deliberately pushed himself into my private space. "Nothing wrong with a cuddle", but then he'd be rubbing my breast. He did that in public once and almost laughed at me when I looked at him, moving away quickly. His grin was huge and his expression was one of conceit and utter disdain for me. "You idiot. Look what I can do - and you put up with it!". That he'd do it in public shocked me so much. I began complete withdrawal from him at that point. Although I had never left my daughter alone with him before then anyway, I was determined to keep her away from him. I left the area within a year of that.

Tuesday, 22 April 2008

... to there being more than the alienator's point of view, I'm going to have a phone call with my Step-dad tonight. It occurred to me yesterday that I don't actually know the full reasons why my mother left the male parent. I have a vague recollection of being told about mistreatment, but her opinion, point of view, memory, reasons, etc did not matter to me while I trusted the alienator. She had no good reason, according to him, and left because her family hate him. Her family are evil. They are wicked. Etcetera.

But they were always nice to me. I loved them. I liked being around them. I couldn't reconcile the devils he told me about with the loving family members I associated with (and so we come back to me believing I was stupid, because the Alienator told me I couldn't see the truth. I needed him to help me ...).

So anyway, should be an interesting talk with the Step-dad. He's working away from home at the moment so I don't have to worry about his wife being upset, and he seemed happy enough to talk about Mum ...

Just FYI, I'm not on any mailing lists anymore. I withdrew from them a couple of weeks ago so if you've sent me a message via one of them, I won't have received it. Please contact me via the email address on the profile page (on the left, down the page) or the address you found via the mailing list. I answer ALL emails (unless they're asking me what my favourite cookie is).

Will only be posting here for the foreseeable future (and yes, I'll be continuing. Sorry about my misery fit. I guess it's just part and parcel of life in general that once in a while things will get on top of us. I'm really grateful for the commenters who reminded me of the purpose of this blog: to help people. I have a responsibility to those people who come here regularly because it helps them in their own PA struggles. It's very easy to forget others when you sink like I did. Depressive episodes are inherently selfish (I mean that as a neutral statement, not that the Depressed are selfish people) and the world can disappear from view. The insomnia peaked during that week too but I'm dealing with it now.).

Friday, 18 April 2008

So, the last post WAS a gigantic self-indulgent fit of the maudlins. I was feeling quite bogged down, as you can tell. Everything got on top of me.

And then I discovered that my friend's 42 year old fiance quite literally dropped dead on Sunday last. I'm not exaggerating: he absolutely, positively just keeled over and died.

Then I stopped whinging pretty quickly.

He'd been advised of an arrhythmia (sp?) a couple of years ago but was cleared in November. You can imagine the incredible shock my friend is feeling right now. She doesn't know what's going on. We are all going to support her and take care of her, and her kids (hers, not his), but other than that all we can do is count our own blessings. She has never suffered grief before so I didn't have the heart to tell her, when she said "Ooh it's time for us to catch up!" the other day, that grief is about to kick her ass - but that she WILL feel better eventually.

So, I would say that today we should all be grateful that our loved ones may be alienated, but alive. WE are alive and, I hope, healthy.

Monday, 14 April 2008

This blog may end now. I'm not sure, but I don't know if I'll post anymore.

I have recently discovered that I have Asperger's Syndrome. It's not a surprise but it's not a good thing either.

I have always imagined my social difficulties and confusion about people's behaviours to be due to Parental Alienation and my dysfunctional upbringing (although I've often said I brought myself up, having been ignored/neglected/messed with by inadequate parenting), and that with time I would grow out of them.

At the age of 37, I'm still socially inept and awkward, hence me speaking to the right people who gave me this diagnosis.

It explains an awful lot. It removes some of the blame for my difficult relationship with my mother from PA/my male parent, but it doesn't absolve him. He still did what he did. Asperger's Syndrome exacerbated the antagonism between Mum and me, to a large extent because the condition was unknown when I was a child.

I can now relax into who I am, for once in my life. Now I can learn not to panic about panicking about social situations (not a typo). The diagnosis has given me a certain level of peace with who I am. It's not my fault. I am not bad. I have not brought it upon myself. I can plan around it now without feeling foolish or childish or deliberately awkward or incapable. I planned a trip to our capital city last week, based around what I can and can't cope with, and it was the best trip I've ever had - I didn't put myself in a single situation that was bad for me because now I understand my limits, so no stress occurred.

However now I know that I'm never going to change. I am this socially inept person for the rest of my life. I am never going to be like you. I am always going to find social situations challenging and confusion and EXHAUSTING. It's never going to change because my brain is a little bit broken. I am never going to have a full social life or groups of friends I can relax with.

My mother is dead, all my grandparents are dead, my male parent is too dangerous to be around, my sister wishes me dead (because she received as much of my bad/incorrect behaviour due to Asperger's as my mother did), my brothers avoid me because of the Asperger's, my extended family all avoid me. People avoid me in general because of the Asperger's.

It's always going to be like this and I can't tell anyone why, at least not until my youngest daughter is grown up (9 years time) because I have a spiteful ex who will use it against me.

I also cannot tell anyone that I couldn't get out of bed this morning because of despair, because I am afraid my children will be taken from me. Parental Alienation and Asperger's Syndrome have ruined my life. I am planning the next 30 years around the fact that I will be by myself (although my children are good to me and always will be).

I am not about to do anything extreme, don't worry - but there are worse thoughts in my head right now than ever in my life before. This blog is the only place I can be honest and take these thoughts out of my brain, because they've been rolling around in there since the beginning of March. If it weren't for my kids, I'd have been dead a long time ago simply because of the PA, and now, if I didn't have them, this blog would not have this entry.